Courting His Amish Wife

by Emma Miller

  The old mare they’d brought from New York lifted its head, gazing in Levi’s direction when he raised his voice. Even their old horse was upset with him, Levi thought morosely.

  “Come on. You’ve been home less than a week,” Jacob argued, his tone calm. “And if we’re going to make more space for you to build those buggies, we have to put up walls. Dat’s already moved up his plans by a good six months so you can start working.”

  Levi crossed his arms over his chest and said nothing. Tomorrow he’d have been back in Hickory Grove a week. He’d have been married a week, and still, his father was upset with him. And things weren’t going much better with his wife.

  Levi didn’t see much of Eve during the day. She worked in the kitchen and in the garden with Rosemary and the girls, and Levi did what his father asked of him around the farm. They had meals together, of course, but then they were in a room full of people. Only at night were he and Eve alone and then, the moment Levi closed the bedroom door, both of them became irritable with each other. She seemed upset with him the minute she got within six feet of him, and he responded with equal, irrational crossness. He hadn’t thought it would be easy to be a new husband under the circumstances, but this wasn’t what he had expected at all. Not from Eve and, worse, not from himself.

  “You need to have patience,” Jacob urged gently. “You know how Dat is. He likes things to go as planned and when they don’t...” He shrugged. “It takes him a little time to adjust.”

  “Are you talking about me wanting to start the business sooner, or my marriage?” Levi asked.

  “Both.”

  Levi looked away. He respected Jacob’s honesty with him. He watched the orange cat trot across a two-by-four they’d added to the pile, comically trying to balance as the board tilted under its weight. “Dat is disappointed in me,” he said quietly.

  “He loves you, Levi. You just need to give him some time.”

  Levi nodded, appreciating the fact that his brother didn’t go into the specific reason why his father was disappointed in him. “I know,” he murmured. “But I want to get to work. I have to build a buggy so I can sell it, so I can have some money to start saving for a house for Eve and me. So we can get out of Dat’s house.”

  “Right. You’re a married man now, aren’t you?” Jacob smiled good-naturedly. “How are you finding that so far?”

  Levi sighed. “Honestly?” He met his brother’s gaze. Jacob had their father’s brown eyes. “Not what I expected. It’s...harder than I thought it would be. I’m not sure what Eve wants from me.”

  “Well...” He drew in a breath slowly. “I imagine Eve could use a helping of your patience, too. From what she had to say about her family life, Hickory Grove has to be quite a change.” He chuckled. “This family has to be a whole lot different from what she’s used to.”

  Levi responded testily. “How do you know what she came from?”

  “Because I asked her,” Jacob pushed back.

  Levi set his jaw, surprised by the jealousy that flared in his chest. “When were you conversing with my wife? Where was I?”

  “We were in the garden this morning. You’d gone to the lumberyard, and Tara asked me to help her and Eve with the pole beans’ trellises. One of the wooden posts was leaning, and the wires had loosened up.” He shrugged. “We talked while we worked. She seems very nice, your wife. I like her.”

  “I bet you do.”

  Jacob frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Levi walked away from his brother and into the bright sunlight without another word.

  * * *

  Eve picked up a stack of white bowls from the kitchen table, then set them down again, flustered, not recalling what Tara had just told her. “Should I take the bowls outside now or wait?”

  Tara closed the freezer door, wiping her hands on her apron. “You should leave them. We’re going to go outside and sit for a while. Then we’ll have the strawberry ice cream when the men get back from the barn. No telling how long they’ll be. You know how men are.” She brought the fingers of one hand to her thumb repeatedly. “Talk, talk, talk. Mam says women have nothing over men when it comes to gabbing on a visiting Sunday.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe I should stay here.” Eve gazed around the large, airy kitchen. “And get things ready.”

  “Ne. Everything is already set. Ice cream is in the freezer. Bowls and spoons are out.” Tara grabbed Eve’s hand. “I want you to get to know my new friend Chloe. She just moved here with her aunt and uncle from Indiana.” She halted in the laundry room, turning to Eve, her eyes wide. “Did I tell you she was betrothed, but she broke it off? I don’t know why. No one does, but I’m hoping once we’re better friends, she’ll tell me.”

  Eve hesitated before she spoke, considering whether it was best to keep her thoughts to herself. That had always been her father’s advice. He used to tell her that no one wanted to know what she thought about anything. But it seemed to her that in Levi’s family, opinions, as well as discussion, were welcome, even encouraged. And she so wanted to be a part of this family, to be one of them. She wanted to be a good wife and a good sister-in-law and daughter-in-law.

  “Tara,” Eve said gently, pulling her hand from hers. “It might be that Chloe doesn’t want to share what happened between her and her betrothed.”

  Tara blinked her pretty green eyes. “Why?”

  Eve shrugged, thinking of her own circumstances that brought her to Hickory Grove. “Maybe it’s painful for her.”

  Tara seemed to consider that for a moment, and then her jaw dropped. “Oh. Ya, maybe you’re right. I wouldn’t want to upset her.” She seemed a bit disappointed. “So you don’t think I should ask her?”

  Eve shook her head. “Definitely not. If she wants to tell you once you know each other better, she will.”

  “You’re probably right.” Tara gave Eve a quick hug. “Thank you.”

  Eve hugged her back. “For what?”

  “For keeping me out of hot water with my mam. She’s always saying my mouth gets me in trouble.” She shrugged. “And for being my friend. For being my sister. Mam says that when you love someone, you have to tell them when they’re about to make a mistake. Even if you might hurt their feelings. But don’t worry. My feelings aren’t hurt.”

  Eve bit down on her lower lip. Since her arrival, everyone in Levi’s family had been kind to her, but Tara had gone out of her way to include Eve in her everyday life, offering friendship at every turn. This first week of marriage had been so hard for Eve that she didn’t know what she would have done without Tara.

  So far, marriage was not at all what she had imagined it would be. Of course, when she had thought about marrying when she was younger, it had been in only a dreamy sort of way. She’d assumed she would get to know her betrothed before their wedding day, courting for months, maybe even a full year. She thought she would know the man she married as well as she knew herself before they set up housekeeping together.

  The truth was, she didn’t know Levi at all. She knew that he was a good man, of course, a man of faith. She knew he was kind; else, he would never have offered to marry her. But she didn’t know who he was as a person much beyond his devotion to his family—his father in particular—and his love for food. They’d barely talked in the week between his proposal and the wedding. Then once they arrived in Hickory Grove, they spent most hours of the day apart.

  The only time they were alone was in the bedroom they shared, and that was quickly becoming a disaster. By the time they climbed the stairs to bed, they were both spent from a day of hard work. The forced closeness before they knew each other put them both on edge, and Eve found she could barely tolerate Levi once he closed their bedroom door. He was so handsome and such a catch that Eve felt unattractive and undeserving of him. And she took it out on him.

  The night before, she had gotten up in the
middle of the night to use the bathroom and accidentally tripped over his foot where he lay on the floor. When he cried out in pain, startled from his sleep, she’d been cross with him, telling him it was his fault. Levi’s behavior hadn’t been much better. Two nights before, she’d opened the window because she was hot. Then he’d closed it, saying he was cold on the floor. Still hot, she’d opened it again, only for Levi to get up and slam the window shut so hard that the glass had rattled and Rosemary had called from the end of the hallway, asking if everything was all right.

  Eve knew this was not how a man and woman, bound by marriage, were supposed to treat each other, but she didn’t know what to do about it. And she had no one to ask because no one in Hickory Grove, including Levi’s family, knew them to be anything but a happily married couple.

  “Want to go talk to Chloe until the men come back from the barn?” Tara asked, stealing Eve from her reverie.

  Eve found a brave smile, thankful for the friendship Tara had offered so readily. “Ya, let’s.”

  Hand in hand, they went out of the house and into the backyard. There, women sat in the shade of giant maple trees, small children played in the grass and babes slept in their mothers’ arms.

  Because it was visiting Sunday and there was no church for their district, Rosemary had taken the opportunity to invite friends over. According to Tara, her family either had friends and family over or went visiting every Sunday that they didn’t attend services. While there were no church services on visiting day, it was still meant to be a day of rest. Any unnecessary work was frowned upon. The men fed and watered the animals, but no one hitched a plow or repaired a shutter. The women provided meals, but there was no scrubbing of floors or picking strawberries. Meals were simple: either foods like soups and casseroles were prepared the day before and reheated on the back of the woodstove, or they ate sandwiches or cold salads, also prepared before the Sabbath.

  Benjamin, like Eve’s father, had gathered his family in their parlor for morning and evening prayers, but there ended the similarity between Eve’s old visiting Sunday and her new one. Benjamin did not force children to sit all day quietly. Instead, they were encouraged to run and play. And the adults were not required to spend the day seated on hard benches, in contemplative prayer. Also, no one in the Miller family wore their heavy, black Sunday clothing on visiting Sundays. Everyone simply wore comfortable, clean clothes. Instead of donning her black church dress, Eve had put on the brand-new peach-colored dress Rosemary had made for her.

  The other difference Eve noticed that morning, her first Visiting Sunday with Levi’s family, was how kind and gentle everyone was to each other in the house. It was as if on this day, they set aside the business of their lives to be sure they were living the lives God meant for them. There were no disagreements at the breakfast table, no chastising, only kind words exchanged and gentle laughter.

  “Chloe!” Tara called, her arm linked through Eve’s as they approached three picnic tables where the women were gathered.

  As in Lancaster County, the married women naturally sat together, and the unmarried gathered separately. Without hearing a word said, Eve knew that the married women talked of children and housekeeping, while the younger women chattered about boys, singings and their dreams of the men they would marry. Eve didn’t feel like she belonged with either group so she was happy to go along with whatever Tara wanted.

  “Chloe!” Tara called. “Here she is. Eve.”

  Several married women looked in their direction, and Eve felt herself blush. Rosemary had introduced her to them all earlier, before Eve found an excuse to escape to the kitchen, but as with Levi’s family, it was all so overwhelming. Everyone knew who she was, knew her name and where she’d come from, but they were all mixed up in her head now. Chloe, however, she had not met because Eve had fled to the security of the kitchen before she and her family arrived.

  Tara and Eve stopped short as a little girl in a pink dress and adorable white apron toddled in front of them on unsteady legs. Hot on her heels was Ginger’s little girl, Lizzy, who was four.

  “Come back, Ada!” Lizzy cried. Then she called over her shoulder to one of the mothers, “I’ll get her!”

  Tara’s friend Chloe walked across the freshly cut grass to meet them. Chloe’s hair, covered mostly by her prayer kapp, was so blond that it looked white. And when the young woman grew nearer, Eve saw that her eyebrows and lashes were the same hue.

  “It’s goot to meet you, Eve,” Chloe said. “Nice to meet someone else new to Hickory Grove. We only moved here a few weeks ago.”

  “Tara! Tara, come here! I want to meet Levi’s wife.”

  Eve turned at the same time as Chloe and Tara to see a woman in her forties waving them to where she sat in a lawn chair. Ada’s mother, also a new arrival. “I want to meet Eve.”

  Tara leaned over and whispered in Eve’s ear, “Sorry.”

  “For what?” Eve whispered back.

  Tara only opened her eyes wider in a you’ll see soon enough expression. Then, side by side, the three young women approached the older woman beckoning them.

  “This is Eunice Gruber,” Tara introduced. “They live down the road. I think you met her son John at church last week. Cute with the fuzzy eyebrows,” she added in a whisper in Eve’s ear.

  Eve forced a smile and nodded to Eunice. “Glad to meet you.”

  Eunice was a slender woman with broad cheeks and a birthmark on her chin. “I was surprised to hear Levi had married so suddenly,” the older woman said, coming to her feet.

  That didn’t take long, Eve thought.

  “When the family came home from church—I missed it, because little Ada was running a fever—and my husband told me Levi had brought a bride home from Lancaster County, I said Barnabas, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” She shooed away a fly buzzing around her head. “I said, I’d know if Levi had married.” She opened her thin arms wide. “And now, come to find out, I was wrong.”

  Not sure what to say, Eve just stood there between Chloe and Tara.

  As it turned out, she didn’t have to say anything because Eunice kept talking. “I thought for certain Rosemary would have told me Levi was marrying, us being such good friends.” She narrowed her gaze. “But then I started to wonder. What if Rosemary and Benjamin didn’t know Levi was marrying? What if they had eloped?” She leaned closer. “Did you elope?”

  Eve froze in panic, unsure how to respond.

  Eunice took another step toward Eve. “Well, did you? What town are you from in Lancaster County? Maybe I know your family.”

  Eve felt her heart thud in her chest. She didn’t know what to say.

  “Ach! Here come the men,” Tara cried, looking in the direction of the barns. “And I don’t even have the ice cream out.” She grabbed Eve’s arm. “Would you help me, Eve, else I know my mam will be cross with me.” She began to pull Eve in the direction of the house, calling over her shoulder, “Talk to you later, Eunice!”

  “Wait! I’m coming, too,” Chloe declared, hurrying across the grass.

  Eve heaved a sigh of relief and linked her arm through Tara’s, thankful her new friend had rescued her from what was bound to have become a more uncomfortable situation than it already was.

  “If you haven’t already figured it out,” Tara explained as the young women made a beeline for the house, “you’ve just met Hickory Grove’s gossip. Eunice knows everything, and what she doesn’t know, she finds out.”

  Chloe giggled. “We had a Eunice back in Washington State. Her name was Trudy. She was always repeating other people’s business.”

  Eve looked from Tara on one side of her to Chloe on the other.

  “Did she tell the truth?” Tara asked. “Because Eunice isn’t just nosy. She doesn’t always get the facts right. When my mam had her surgery on her foot last year, she told Mary Fisher’s mother that Mam was in the f
amily way again. Then Eunice had gone on about how Mam was too old for babies, that James and Josiah were proof of that, and that she ought to be ashamed of herself.”

  “Ne!” Chloe exclaimed, her eyes growing round. “She did not!”

  “Ya, and my twin brothers just learning to walk!” Tara led Eve and Chloe up the steps to the porch. “See, I told you you would like Chloe,” she told Eve. “I know Chloe and I aren’t married, but I still think we can be the best of friends, don’t you?”

  So relieved that Tara had saved her from Eunice’s questioning, Eve almost threw her arms around Levi’s sister. “Ya, I think we can be.” She put her hands together the way she had already seen Rosemary do several times. “Now let’s get that ice cream to our guests.”

  A short time later, the three young women were set up at one of the picnic tables. There, they scooped the last of the three gallons of homemade strawberry ice cream out of the plastic containers. Almost at the bottom of her tub, Eve looked up to see the last person in her line to get the homemade treat. She gulped.

  It was Levi.

  She’d been so busy with the task that she hadn’t even seen him. “One scoop or two?” she asked, pushing the heavy spoon down into the tub.

  “Three if you’ve got it. Tara makes the best strawberry ice cream I’ve ever had.” He handed her a bowl.

  “There’s enough,” she said softly, keeping her eyes down.

  “And enough for you, too? If there isn’t, we can split it.”

  Eve considered telling him she wasn’t going to have ice cream. Back home, her father had often criticized her taste for sweets. But then, glancing around, she noticed that the young folks, married and unmarried, were settling down as couples to have their dessert. Even Ginger and her husband, who had four children by his previous marriage, were stealing a few minutes of time alone together.

  This is what we need, Eve thought. Levi and I need to spend time together to get to know each other. And then, before she lost her nerve, she said, “Ya, Husband, there’s enough for me, too. I thought we could have ours together. Under that tree,” she dared, indicating an oak tree with her ice cream scoop.